Cataglottism means French kissing, a word built on a root connected with the tongue. A limerick by Beswan Bird puts it to work with a comic twist involving a beloved cat. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of ““Cataglossism,” an...
You’re at a social gathering and meet someone you’d like to know better. What do you ask to get a real conversation going? Some people lead with “What do you do?,” while others avoid talking about work entirely. Still others...
In the U.S., we say mwah for the kissing noise. In parts of South America, it’s chuik. And for linguists, of course, it’s a bilabial lingual ingressive click. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Writing a Kiss”...
What do you call the end piece of a loaf of bread? Names for that last slice include heel, bread butt, kissing crust, bunce, skirk, krunka, truna, tumpee, canust, the nose, and in Spanish, codo, which means “elbow.” This is part of a...
Shut your piehole! means “Shut your mouth!” Dave in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, heard it during a tense exchange at a mechanic’s shop. Piehole appears to be a U.S. offshoot of the older cakehole, recorded from the 1940s and likely associated with British...
Whoever wrote “The Book of Love” neglected to include the handy emoticon <3, which looks like a heart if you turn your head sideways. Grant and Martha talk about how that bit of affectionate shorthand can function as a verb, and about...